Phillies plan similiar to N.L. foe

It is obvious to see what the Phillies are trying to do.

Get veterans on one-year deals and hope that they play well enough to become trade chips at the deadline to acquire more prospects.

The most recent acquisition is Clay Buchholz. There is upside in this trade because of the strong second half he put together in 2016. The guy knows how to pitch and is a 2 time all-star.

Going into the season, the Phillies will have a young crop of prospects in AA and AAA.

By mid-July, guys like J.P. Crawford, Nick Williams, Rhys Hoskins, and Dylan Cozens could be with the Phillies.

The Phillies have one of the best farm systems in the majors.

This is the year that we should see some of those prospects at Citizens Bank Park.

This is the year that we find out what prospects are going to be part of the contending future and which ones are not.

The Phillies have one of the smallest payrolls in the league. General manager Matt Klentak has set up this team to spend big when the 2018 winter rolls around.

Bryce Harper, Manny Machado, Josh Donaldson, and Matt Harvey are just a few that will become free agents in 2018. That is time many are saying the Phillies should be ready to contend.

The good news for fans is this plan is similar to what Theo Epstein did with the Cubs. Epstein traded veterans on short-term contracts (Andrew Cashner, Ryan Dempster, Scott Feldman, Jason Hammel, Jeff Samardzija) for guys like Anthony Rizzo, Kyle Hendricks, Jake Arrieta, and Addison Russell. Those are some of the core members of the 2016 World Series team.

Epstein then went to free agency to spend big dollars on Jon Lester, Jason Heyward, and Ben Zobrist.

He hit on his first round picks Javier Baez, Kyle Schwarber, and Kris Bryant.

Now, the Cubs are expected to be contenders for a long, long time.

There are similarities with what Klentak is doing with the Phillies and that should make fans excited.